Verizon gearing up for LTE rollout -- its computer system says so

Sure, this 3G thing's been fun and all. But it's getting to be about time for some honest-to-goodness LTE data to give Sprint's Wimax (and arguably T-Mobile's pseudo-4G) a run for its money. And if the screen shots we received today are any indication, Verizon's well on its way to finally launching its LTE service. Engadget got separate confirmation (as well as some nifty 4G fact sheets), and hopefully this all means we'll have some Verizon LTE sooner rather than later. One more shot after the break.

Don't bother waiting if you want to upgrade, Verizon will initially only be offering LTE for PC cards, Smartphones are supposed to be early next year and figure on middle of next year before you get a decent selection (assuming you actually have LTE in your area by then). This is probably because voice on LTE is much more difficult to get working than data - a pity they waste so much effort on voice when a data-only solution and VoIP gateway would be much more elegant.

I sincerely DISAGREE. It will be released for phones as well as pc cards.

Did none of you read the article about the LTE phone that just passed FCC last week? LOL. Ok even if 4G service isn't available in your area immediately, if you buy a new phone now, you will have to wait 2 years again to upgrade to a 4G phone?

In conclusion, if your phone still works and is usable till the end of the year, wait for your to upgrade.

i don't understand this. why won't there be a decent phone when LTE starts getting put out? is the EVO, which is the first 4G phone, in some way inferior or a worse choice then any other phone on the market? it actually blows almost all but 1 or 2 phones out of the water. I am going to wait till the end of the year when verizon, hopefully, starts rolling out brand new LTE android phones.

It's Verizon's NETWORK that won't be ready. Supporting LTE voice is a much harder task than data - think of trying to set up your own SIP server at home and getting it to interface with a BRI connection from a landline so you can make your own VoIP calls. LTE is a complete 4G solution, WiMax is a 4G data-only solution and therefore easier. Even still, Sprint had to outsource it to the specialists at Clearwire...

As with everything, the longer you wait the better phones there will be. But plan on waiting until mid next year. This isn't a bad thing, if I had a decent Android phone I could wait but if you're looking to upgrade a phone you don't like I don't know if it's worthwhile.

Well out here in the real world, where 80+% of the country lives, you have one carrier that usually rises above them all in a region and with the exceptions of places like western Kentucky, Colorado and a few other places.. its Verizon.

Wimax and LTE are not mutually exclusive. Wimax is like a city-wide hotspot while LTE is more of an evolution of cellular. They are both useful depending on the situation and any modern network will likely use both technologies.

True, but wimax is junk technology. there is a reason why 80% of the world ignores wimax and 3/4 carriers in the states decided to go with lte. no one is going to implement both here in the states because it is not cost effective

That's just like GSM and cdma. GSM is short range with more towers and cdma is long range with less towers. Ha ha ha more bars in more places. I would rather pay a little extra and receive my phone calls and data than save a little money and have hit or miss service.

Verizon will maintain their existing 3G network in parallel for quite some time. Remember how long the old analog network stuck around? Trust me, you'll be sick of your phone long before they turn off EVDO support for it :)

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